happy halloween!

wish list.

pretty pictures for winter

public art

I saw this incredible installation, Ring, by Arnaud Lapierre on Phaidon's blog and just had to repost it. 

Exterior view of Ring

Made up entirely of mirrored glass cubes, Ring reflects back a broken and distorted version of the Place Vendome, Paris, to the viewer, showing the historic buildings in an entirely new light. What I love about Lapierre's piece is its dynamism, Ring shows us a constantly changing scenario; it adapts with each passing hour. The public are also free to venture inside Lapierre's installation, with its warped reflections offering an escape into an entirely different world. I've been looking at it for so long that it's given me a bit of a headache, but I like to think that's sort of the desired effect of Ring.

The interior view of Ring

Ring was installed during FIAC 2011, and was on display in Paris's Place Vendome from 20 - 23rd October. 

Hopefully it'll pop up in London soon!

Tracey Emin at Aberdeen Art Gallery

For you

"neon makes people happier" - Tracey Emin

I'm so glad I got the chance to see one of Emin's Neon series at the Aberdeen Art Gallery this week, it really changed my appreciation of Tracey Emin as an artist. It's funny how easily neon lighting, generally reserved for kebab shops and the sort of nightclubs most people tend to avoid, can be turned into a sentimental and really quite heart breaking piece of art with just a few short words.

Degas at the Royal Academy

Edgar Degas, Ballerina

A few weeks ago I saw the Degas and the Ballet: Picturing Movement exhibition at the RA in london, and it definitely has to be one of the best exhibitions I've ever seen. Regardless of the fact that I was a little biased because Degas is one of my favourite painters, Picturing Movement really was stunning, it was a masterclass in how to successfully curate an exhibition.

The entire upper galleries were transformed to show the processes through which Degas strove to show movement in his painting: from the pioneering work of contemporary scientists and photographers, to the painter's own foray into photography, Degas and the Ballet does not simply cover the completed works of the painter. The exhibition instead shows the build up to each work; the preparatory sketches and influential photographs are placed alongside the finished painting, giving the viewer a fascinating insight into Degas's mind.

Degas would study the ballerina's movement from all angles, as well as challenging himself to sketch the dancers during their rehearsals at the studio in order for him to understand how movement manipulated the body, and how best to show this is in a static medium such as painting. The painting of the ballerina to the left is a particularly good example of Degas's skill and ability to picture movement.

However, my favourite object in the exhibition was actually not a painting by Degas, but the sculpture flight of a gull, made to understand the process of flight by a contemporary of Degas, the scientist Etienne-Jules Marey. I love that it was originally created for science but is really a piece of art in its own right. Which is really what the whole exhibition is about; understanding movement, capturing it, and channelling it into something fixed but beautiful.

Etienne-Jules Marey, Flight of a Gull.

The exhibition runs until the 11th December, go see it if you can! 

orion nebula

Astrology blows my mind. It's something I'm completely fascinated with but have no desire to learn anything more about; once you strip it all down to chemical reactions or combustion or whatever else goes on inside a nebula, you take away a little bit of the magic. (I just googled nebula, apparently they are made up of space dust, ace) But anyway, here is a picture of an orion nebula from the hubble telescope. IT'S SO COOL.